Customer service turns to Twitter

By Gillian Shaw, Canwest News Service; Vancouver SunMay 4, 2009

Recently I asked people on my Twitter network how much data they use on their iPhone. Within minutes Keith McArthur, billed on his Twitter profile as 'social media guy at Rogers & Fido. Dad at home,' tweeted to say he'd check the average data usage stats and get back to me.

Some time ago, in a Twitter conversation about netbooks I mentioned I was having trouble trying to order one from Dell. It wasn't long before RichardatDELL was in my Twitter stream asking about it and steering my problem in the right direction. I started following RichardatDELL and found that wasn't an isolated experience: While his tweets are a mixture of business and chatty comments, every so often you'll see him answering a tweet like a recent one from a Dell customer complaining the motherboard on his computer has to be replaced for the second time.

"DM (direct message) me service tag and some info. Will check," RichardatDELL, a member of Dell's social media team wrote back.

While some companies have embraced social media as a means of connecting with their customers, others are still scratching their corporate heads over the growing popularity of the micro-blogging service Twitter.

That could change fast with the announcement by Salesforce.com that it is adding Twitter to its Service Cloud customer-service platform.

The Service Cloud is Salesforce's answer to reaching customers who are increasingly giving up on long telephone waits and frustrating trips through automated answering services.

"Twenty years ago, customer service was all about picking up the phone and having a conversation with an expert to resolve your issues. Since then, companies have spent billions of dollars building out phone trees, self-service portals, and outsourced call centres. Cheaper? Sure. But what was the impact on service? Although this investment gave customers more ways to contact a company, it made it much more difficult to have a meaningful conversation or find the right answer," writes Salesforce in its pitch for Cloud Service, which launched in January.

"Today's customers are turning their backs on the old world of service and looking to the Internet -- the "cloud" -- to access information and find answers to their questions. . . . In fact, your customers are probably already having conversations about your company on the Internet in social communities like Facebook and Twitter, in online discussion forums, or in enthusiast blogs and Web sites."

The Twitter addition, now in beta, puts Twitter conversations into Salesforce's Service Cloud, allowing companies to keep track of what is being said about them online, track specific discussions on issues and take part in the Twitter conversation -- all tasks that could be carried out by individuals through their Twitter profiles but now integrated with the customer relationship management software.

The Twitter addition will expand on the Service Cloud offerings that already include Google search, Facebook and other social networks, will be available this summer at no additional charge for Service Cloud users.